Amplify Alignment

byOliver Stewart

We routinely hear the challenges and concerns from marketers before launching them on Opal. The increasing speed and complexity of marketing is creating a lack of alignment at every step of the brand marketing process. We see it as one of the most fundamental challenges facing brand marketing teams today. Do any of these statements resonate with you?

“I literally have no idea what the rest of our brand is working on.”

“Don’t tell my boss, but we have no way to track if the content was approved before it went out.”

“It’s not that I don’t trust my team to get things done, but I can’t see who’s responsible for doing what.”

If you said yes to any of these then it’s possible that you have an alignment problem. Without alignment, it’s nearly impossible to coordinate strategic and tactical work efforts. Without coordination, the quality of team productivity and morale can rapidly diminish.

But that’s not all. To really understand the impact of misalignment you have to dig a little deeper. At the heart of the alignment lies the notion of trust. A recent report from the Harvard Business Review touched on the strategic importance of fostering trust, listing talent acquisition as a key benefit.

Companies that foster a trusting culture will have an advantage in the war for talent: Who would choose to stay in a stressful, divisive atmosphere if offered a productive, supportive one?

Lack of alignment breeds a culture deficient in trust for team members and process, inhibiting progress.

To be strategic, individuals must trust that they know all of the moving parts they are building for. If teams are working in silos or separate tools, there’s no way to see the moving parts.

To be productive, individuals must trust that their understanding of the status or phase of a piece of content is correct. If a team’s status is communicated through strings of emails or meetings, it can be hard to know the latest or who’s responsible for doing what.

To be effective, individuals must trust their ability to get their work done and share it with the people who need to see it, and keep moving forward. If teams don’t have easy ways of sharing, they end up spending more time trying to build ways to align than moving the work forward.

Opal was built to create unprecedented levels of alignment and trust within marketing teams. One Digital Marketing Director shares how Opal helps foster a culture of trust within her team.

“High adoption of Opal across my team is everything. Adoption = alignment and alignment = increased trust and a stronger culture. If I know that everyone’s in Opal, then it means they’re no longer scattered across a sea of other platforms and channels, which means they can focus on what’s truly important – collaborating effectively to produce impactful content.”

Her team echoes this sentiment, praising the benefits of having all the moving pieces of their campaign strategy and content in Opal. This team believes Opal has drastically increased alignment and enabled them to set a collective focus on the most important initiatives. Their new process is making it possible to get higher quality work out the door with fewer revisions, fewer fire drills, fewer late nights and fewer headaches. Does this sound like a dream come true? Get your team aligned with Opal and get your weekends back (See my previous article). When you’re aligned with a team that you can trust, you can spend more time doing the fun things that got you into the marketing field in the first place.

If you think your team has an alignment challenge, take comfort in knowing that there’s a better way. Everyone at Opal is passionate about enabling marketing teams with better alignment and trust. We’re here to help you and your team do the best work of your lives.